Shorebird of the Week – September 1, 2016

At the end of the season I would always have several players who were perhaps deserving but not selected. This last Shorebird of the Week is one of those holdovers from 2015 who’s been quite effective in his return season.

It took 18 appearances for Mike Burke to pitch in a game I attended, but his one-out save on Sunday evening was the first of Burke’s two straight saves at a time when the Shorebirds maintain extremely faint playoff hopes (they need a lot of help, but can greatly enhance their chances by winning out.) Last night Burke came up with a two-inning save to help Delmarva sweep the fading Greensboro Grasshoppers in a doubleheader and move to within one-half game of the overall second-place Hickory Crawdads. (The help they need is from Hagerstown, who edged Delmarva by 1/2 game to win the first half and needs to win the second half for the Shorebirds to have a chance of making the postseason as the second-best overall record in the division – the Shorebirds are out of contention for the second half crown.) That sweep also assured Delmarva a second consecutive winning season after six straight losing campaigns from 2009-14.

While Mike spent the 2015 season exclusively at Delmarva, going 2-2 with a 3.36 ERA and 1.02 WHIP, the exceptional part of his overall line was the 53-to-10 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 67 total innings. This year, though, Mike has bounced around between the Aberdeen roster (stashed for most of the first half there), the Frederick Keys, and Delmarva. As a whole Burke has gone 1-3 with a 3.49 ERA this season, but he pitched very effectively at Frederick (1 run and 2 hits allowed in 8 innings) and Aberdeen (4 1/3 shutout innings in 2 appearances.) He’s maintained that exceptional K/BB ratio with 53 strikeouts and 8 walks between the three stops.

Burke is an Cleveland native who pitched his college ball at the State University of New York at Buffalo (we MAC folks just call it Buffalo) and was a 30th round pick by the Orioles in 2014, so in essence he’s playing with house money at this point in his career. But having just turned 24 on Saturday he still has plenty of time to make it up the ladder and control will likely be his calling card. Allowing just 20 walks in 139 1/3 innings is a good way to advance, especially with a strikeout per inning on average. He deserves a shot at seeing if he can keep that stellar work going in Frederick in 2017.

And thus we have the 242nd and final Shorebird of the Week – a list of prospects and suspects that epitomizes the Shorebirds over the years I have covered them. We won’t know until next season which list Mike will find himself on, but like everyone who plays here I hope he gets the opportunity to see his dream come true and make it to The Show. As for me, I’m already looking at next year’s schedule and digging the fact we will have eleven Thirsty Thursdays – I just won’t be putting up a Shorebird of the Week to complement them.

Thanks for being a part of the SotW ride – but don’t forget Shorebird of the Year comes next week and on September 15 I will do my annual picks and pans – so the season lives on for a bit whether Delmarva makes the playoffs or not.